Relative Phosphorus Utilization Efficiency, Growth Response, and Phosphorus Uptake Kinetics of Brassica Cultivars under a Phosphorus Stress Environment

Abstract

Plants grown in highly weathered or highly alkaline calcareous soils often experience phosphorus (P) stress but never a P‐free environment. Thus, applications of mineral P fertilizers are often required to achieve maximum yield, but recovery of applied P fertilizers is notoriously low. Phosphorus deprivation elicits a complex array of morphological, physiological, and biochemical adaptations among plant species and genotypes to enhance P acquisition and utilization efficiency. Ten Brassica cultivars were grown hydroponically to investigate their relative efficiency to utilize deficiently (20‐µM) and adequately (200‐µM) supplied P, using Johnson's modified solution. Cultivars differed significantly (P<0.001) in biomass accumulation. Orthophosphate concentration and uptake in shoot and root, absolute and relative growth rate, and P‐utilization efficiency (PUE) were also significantly different among various Brassica cultivars. Root‐shoot ratio and specific absorption rate were substantially increased in plants subjected to low P supply. Shoot and root dry‐matter yield as well as total biomass production correlated significantly (P<0.01) with their total P uptake and PUE. Cultivars, which were efficient in P utilization, were also efficient accumulators of biomass under adequate as well as deficient levels of P supply. As part of the study, kinetic parameters of P uptake were evaluated for six contrasting Brassica cultivars in PUE, grown in nutrient solution. The kinetic parameters related to P influx were maximal transport rate (Vmax), the Michaelis–Menten constant (Km), and the external concentration when net uptake is zero (Cmin). Lower Km and Cmin values were indicative of P‐uptake ability of the cultivars, evidencing their adaptability to P‐stress conditions. In another experiment, six cultivars were exposed to no P nutrition for 27 days after initial feeding on optimum nutrition for 14 days. All the cultivars retranslocated P from aboveground parts to their roots during growth in P‐free conditions, the magnitude of which was variable in different cultivars. Phosphorus concentration at 41 days after transplanting was higher in developing leaves than developed leaves. Translocation of absorbed P from metabolically inactive sites to active sites in plants growing under P‐stress conditions may have helped the tolerant cultivars to establish a better rooting system, which provided basis for tolerance against P‐deficiency stress and increased PUE.